Highest-Rated Movies about 'Apartheid'

Into the Wild (2007), Blood Diamond (2006), District 9 (2009), Cry Freedom (1987), Amandla! A Revolution in Four-Part Harmony (2002), Invictus (2009), The Butler (2013), Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (2013) ... Let's take a look at the ranked list of the best Apartheid movies.

#1. Into the Wild (2007)

Storyline: Based on a true story. After graduating from Emory University, Christopher McCandless abandoned his possessions, gave his entire savings account to charity, and hitchhiked to Alaska to live in the wilderness. Along the way, Christopher encounters a series of characters who shape his life.

Plot Keywords: wilderness, self discovery, alaska, based on true story, journey, following a dream, isolation ...

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#2. Blood Diamond (2006)

Storyline: A story following Archer, a man tortured by his roots. With a strong survival instinct, he has made himself a key player in the business of conflict diamonds. Political unrest is rampant in Sierra Leone as people fight tooth for tooth. Upon meeting Solomon, and the beautiful Maddy, Archer's life changes forever as he is given a chance to make peace with the war around him.

Plot Keywords: civil war, elephant, terrorism, africa, journalist, rebel, diamond ...

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#3. District 9 (2009)

Storyline: In 1982, a massive star ship bearing a bedraggled alien population, nicknamed "The Prawns," appeared over Johannesburg, South Africa. Twenty-eight years later, the initial welcome by the human population has faded. The refugee camp where the aliens were located has deteriorated into a militarized ghetto called District 9, where they are confined and exploited in squalor. In 2010, the munitions corporation, Multi-National United, is contracted to forcibly evict the population with operative Wikus van der Merwe in charge. In this operation, Wikus is exposed to a strange alien chemical and must rely on the help of his only two new 'Prawn' friends.

Plot Keywords: alien, mockumentary, based on short film, witchcraft, whistleblower, weapon, title appears in writing ...

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#4. Cry Freedom (1987)

Storyline: Donald Woods is chief editor of the liberal newspaper Daily Dispatch in South Africa. He has written several editorials critical of the views of Steve Biko. But after having met him for the first time, he changes his opinion. They meet several times, and this means that Woods and his family get attention from the security police. When Steve Biko dies in police custody, he writes a book about Biko. The only way to get it published is for Woods himself to illegally escape the country.

Plot Keywords: white savior, based on book, apartheid, racism, 1970s, civil rights, interracial friendship ...

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#5. Amandla! A Revolution in Four-Part Harmony (2002)

Storyline: Through a chronological history of the South African liberation struggle, this documentary cites examples of the way that music was used in the fight for freedom. Songs united those who were being oppressed and gave those fighting a way to express their plight. The music consoled those incarcerated, and created an effective underground form of communication inside the prisons.—Sujit R. Varma

Plot Keywords: song, activism, africa, civil rights, musician, protest, singing ...

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#6. Invictus (2009)

Storyline: This movie tells the inspiring true story of how Nelson Mandela (Morgan Freeman) joined forces with the Captain of South Africa's rugby team, Francois Pienaar (Matt Damon) to help unite their country. Newly elected President Mandela knows his nation remains racially and economically divided in the wake of Apartheid. Believing he can bring his people together through the universal language of sport, Mandela rallies South Africa's rugby team as they make their historic run to the 1995 Rugby World Cup Championship match.

Plot Keywords: south africa, rugby, president, ends with real life photos, forgiveness, inspiration, stadium ...

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#7. The Butler (2013)

Storyline: Cecil Gaines was a sharecropper's son who grew up in the 1920s as a domestic servant for the white family who casually destroyed his. Eventually striking out on his own, Cecil becomes a hotel valet of such efficiency and discreteness in the 1950s that he becomes a butler in the White House itself. There, Cecil would serve numerous US Presidents over the decades as a passive witness of history with the American Civil Rights Movement gaining momentum even as his family has troubles of its own. As his wife, Gloria, struggles with her addictions and his defiant eldest son, Louis, strives for a just world, Cecil must decide whether he should take action in his own way.

Plot Keywords: butler, u.s. president, civil rights movement, domestic servant, civil rights, hotel, president ...

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#8. Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (2013)

Storyline: Nelson Mandela is a South African lawyer who joins the African National Congress in the 1940s when the law under the Apartheid system's brutal tyranny proves useless for his people. Forced to abandon peaceful protest for armed resistance after the Sharpeville Massacre, Mandela pays the price when he and his comrades are sentenced to life imprisonment for treason while his wife, Winnie, is abused by the authorities herself. Over the decades in chains, Mandela's spirit is unbowed as his struggle goes on in and beyond his captivity to become an international cause. However, as Winnie's determination hardens over the years into a violent ruthlessness, Nelson's own stature rises until he becomes the renowned leader of his movement. That status would be put to the test as his release nears and a way must be found to win a peaceful victory that will leave his country, and all its peoples, unstained.

Plot Keywords: based on book, male underwear, forced to strip, man forced to strip, undressing, unfaithful wife, adultery ...

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#9. Goodbye Bafana (2007)

Storyline: James Gregory once lived in a farm and had befriended a native youth, Bafana, and had even had a photograph taken with him. Years later, now married to Gloria and father of three children (Chris, Brett, and Natasha), James has nothing but shame and regret, as many South African Caucasians in the oppressive Apartheid-era ridiculed him, leading him to hate Africans. He seeks to redeem himself by spying on imprisoned African National Congress Leader, Nelson Mandela. In the restrictive high security prison his job is to censor all written and verbal communications between prisoners, their visitors, and correspondence. James is uncomfortable when he witnesses Caucasian police and security officers' brutality against civilians, including infants, and tries to understand why Nelson became a rebel. This leads him to examine the 'Freedom Charter', a banned document, reportedly known to incite violence against 'whites'. And when he does read this document, he changes his mind about Nelson's ...

Plot Keywords: prison cell, political prisoner, husband wife reunion, freedom fighter, 1990s, 1980s, 1970s ...

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#10. A United Kingdom (2016)

Storyline: In the late 1940s, Prince Seretse Khama of Bechuanaland is studying law in Britain in preparation for his eventual ascension to the throne. There, the dashing prince falls in love with a white British clerk, Ruth Williams, and they plan to marry. While they suspect that his uncle, the Regent, would disapprove, nothing prepares them for the diplomatic firestorm and domestic political tumult their defiant love would spark. Now facing a citizenry leery of a white Briton as their Queen, the international opposition is even more unyielding from the British holding their land as a protectorate and fearful of South Africa's racist backlash to this affront to their apartheid domination. Against all odds, King Khama and Ruth must struggle to maintain their love and help their people in a land that would become the Republic of Botswana.

Plot Keywords: interracial marriage, london england, forbidden love, 1950s, 1940s, africa, radio station ...

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#11. Cry, the Beloved Country (1995)

Storyline: South African church minister Steven Kumalo is summoned from his village to Johannesburg. There he finds that his son Absolom has been jailed in connection with a robbery in which a white man was killed. The father of the white man, James Jarvis, is a supporter of apartheid, the separation of the races which is the law of South Africa. When they encounter each other, both Kumalo and Jarvis come to unexpected realizations not only about their sons, but about the nature of their own humanity.—Jim Beaver <jumblejim@prodigy.net>

Plot Keywords: 1940s, racial tension, apartheid, south africa, remake, based on novel, priest ...

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#12. Zulu (2013)

Storyline: As a child, Ali Neuman narrowly escaped being murdered by Inkatha, a militant political party at war with Nelson Mandela's African National Congress. Only he and his mother survived the carnage of those years. But as with many survivors, the psychological scars remain. Today, Ali is chief of the homicide branch of the South African police in Cape Town. One of his staff is Brian Epkeen, a free-wheeling white officer whose family was originally involved in the establishment of apartheid but who works well with Neuman. Together they have to deal with crime that inevitably exists in sprawling areas of un- and under- employed people, crime exacerbated by gangs, both local and from other parts of Africa. Their job gets even more difficult when the corpses of two young women are found. A new evil has been introduced in the city and a new drug has been introduced to its residents, including both murder victims. At the chaotic crossroads where brutality and modernization collide, the echoes of...

Plot Keywords: police officer, south africa, female nudity, female frontal nudity, survivor, gang, africa ...

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#13. Catch a Fire (2006)

Storyline: A political thriller: the real-life story of a South African hero's journey to freedom. In the country's turbulent and divided times in the 1980s, Patrick Chamusso is an oil refinery foreman and soccer coach who is apolitical - until he and his wife Precious are jailed. Patrick is stunned into action against the country's oppressive reigning system, even as police Colonel Nic Vos further insinuates himself into the Chamussos' lives.—Focus Features

Plot Keywords: photograph, male nudity, bare butt, blindfold, uncle nephew relationship, christmas, communist ...

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#14. Bopha! (1993)

Storyline: In this story of a black policeman during South African apartheid, Danny Glover plays the cop, who believes he's trying to help his people, even while serving as a pawn of the racist government. When his son gets involved in the anti-apartheid movement, he finds himself torn between his family (including long-suffering wife Alfre Woodard) and what he believes is his duty.—M

Plot Keywords: africa, based on play, racism, directorial debut, 1980s, police officer, father son relationship ...

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#15. Sarafina! (1992)

Storyline: As tensions of apartheid spread across South Africa, many students revolts to massive stone throw, a demonstration that comes in a wake of the introduction of Afrikaans language as a means of teaching. This sparks riots among school age young people who have resolved to do what it takes for freedom to come tomorrow. In a township of Soweto, a group of students, led by a beautiful and intelligent young girl, Sarafina, mastermind a plot to rise against the apartheid regime by vehemently rejecting the proposal to have Afrikaans as a medium of instruction. This angers the white people and results in a massive unrest of the students and those others supporting them. Meanwhile, Sarafina's mother accepts a job of a housekeeper in a white household and it angers Sarafina. Following the unrest of students and their possible torture and trial, Sarafina is released from prison, reunites with some of the colleagues and composes a "Freedom is Coming Tomorrow" song.—Isaac Museka Lupupa

Plot Keywords: teacher, reference to nelson mandela, south africa, apartheid, africa, reference to michael jackson, dance ...

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